Written and illustrated by various.
Colours/letters: various
Batman - I - K
Batman in the Eighties 2004 (SC TPB) 192 pages
Written and illustrated by various.
Colours/letters: various
Reprints:
Rating: N/R
Number of readings: 1
I haven't read the full book, hence why I haven't given it an official rating
DC Comics periodically releases TPB collections spotlighting a decade in
the lives of either of its two chief properties, Superman and Batman (such as Superman in the Seventies. The
latest is Batman in the Eighties featuring a variety of tales culled from the
1980s. Essentially, these are "Best of..." collections and, often, the results
can be a bit mixed (everyone will have a favourite story that they felt
should've been included). But Batman in the Eighties is a surprisingly strong
effort, and a nicely diverse one (in contrast, Batman in the Seventies
consisted mainly of stories written only by one author, Denny O'Neil).
I don't have the book, nor have I read all the stories collected in it.
However, I do have a number of the original stories in my collection and,
based on them, I can say this is a good book. Even if the remaining, unread,
stories are utter dreck, it shouldn't detract from the quality of the better
efforts.
"To Kill a Legend", originally published as the lead feature in the 500th
anniversary issue of Detective Comics, has already been collected more than
once over the years (including in The Greatest Batman Stories Ever Told).
Admittedly, I have qualms about that: TPB collections are sufficiently
expensive, and seem to be propogating exponentially, that companies should try
to avoid repetition if possible. With that being said, it's an emotionally
rich tale as Batman is given the opportunity to avert his parents' murder on a
parallel world -- but Robin worries that to do so will mean that parallel
world's Bruce Wayne will never grow up to be Batman. And which is the greater
crime? Intelligently told by writer Alan Brennert, with strong dialogue, and
illustrated competently by Dick Giordano, it's definitely a memorable one,
drawing upon the then-mythos relating to who and why Batman's parents were
initially killed (stuff no longer considered canonical).
The double sized "The Player on the Other Side" (Batman Special #1) may
well be one of prolific comics writer Mike W. Barr's finest achievements. I'm
generally ambivalent about Barr, a writer who often tried for ambitious
themes, but usually with mixed results. But this works exceptionally well.
Batman meets his doppleganger in the Wrath, an assassin whose parents were
killed by a cop the same night Batman's were murdered by a crook, and who grew
up to wage war on all law enforcement. His current target is Commissioner
Gordon -- the one-time beat cop who killed his parents. In addition to the
clever themes of dual destiny, and some memorably written exchanges, it's just
a well crafted thriller, with some nice, edge-of-the-seat suspense scenes
(Batman frantically calling home after realizing the Wrath knows his identity
and that Alfred is in danger). It's drawn by the too rarely seen Michael
Golden, with the only flaw that Golden could only ink of few of his own pages,
leaving the rest to Mike DeCarlo, an inker with a rigid, hard-line style not
wholly suited to Golden's soft, organic pencils. Also the colours in the
climax don't exactly evoke the night time setting. But those are minor
quibbles.
I was surprised by the inclusion of "Shadow Play" (Batman #348) partly
because I initially assumed it was the story from one issue before (which also
had "shadow" in the title) which was more clearly aiming to be a profound
semi-classic. But re-reading "Shadow Play" again, I'm glad they went with it.
Firstly, it's written by Gerry Conway, a comics writer who wrote for just
about every title at one time or another in the 1970s and 1980s (as did most
writers of his generation). Conway had his creative ups and downs, but I don't
think he's ever quite received his due from fandom. And his tenure on Batman,
including an epic masterpiece of Byzantine sub-plots, is one of my favourite
creative periods of any title in any era (as I detail here). But "Shadow Play" is also just a
well told tale, and one that showcases an unusual aspect of Batman -- his
compassion -- as he journeys into the dark catacombs of the Batcave, risking
life and limb, seeking the mad Man-Bat in an effort to cure him. It's well
paced, with Conway's nice ear for easy, humanizing dialogue between the
characters making you believe in them and their relationships, and it's
effectively illustrated by the unusual combo of Gene Colan and Klaus Janson.
What you notice about all three of these stories -- culled from what's
known as pre-Crisis continuity -- is that it's a rather different Batman than
is often depicted today. He's a more human, well rounded Batman -- one capable
of compassion, and of fear, of self-doubt and guilt, and of demonstrating easy
comaraderie with Robin...all while still being driven and brooding.
Gosh -- I miss him.
"Dreadful Birthday, Dear Joker...!" (Batman #321) is a more problematic
choice. It too has been collected more than once before (including in The
Greatest Joker Stories Ever Told). And I just don't see what the fuss is
about. It's a perfectly O.K. romp, but a tad generic -- there's nothing that
sticks out about it. Though, in this context, that might be its appeal -- its
lack of pretension. It's drawn by Walt Simonson and scripter Len Wein is one
of my favourite writers from the Bronze Age. And it's the dialogue that I
appreciate most here. Sometimes with just a line or two, Wein could convey
whole layers of character interaction (such as a brief, understated exchange
between Batman and Selina Kyle, then reformed and dating Bruce Wayne).
This collection also includes a two-part Batgirl tale originally run as a
back up feature. Batgirl had long lurked in the back pages of Detective
Comics, often no more than competently written or illustrated. This story
wasn't so much a breath of fresh air, as it was a tornado of oxygen --
particularly in the art department. Moodily illustrated by the dynamic,
eclectic Trevor Von Eden, and with Barbara Randall (later Barbara Kesel)
writing an off beat tale involving sibling rivalry and corporate crime, it
kicked the dust off the character. It was a Batgirl tale that suddenly made me
look forward to Batgirl tales...so, naturally, it also turned out to be the
last Batgirl tale, at least in that period, as DC dropped it. Why bring in a
whole new creative team...and then pull the rug out from under the character
after only two seven page instalments? Still, particularly visually, I tend to
think of this as one of the Silver Age Batgirl's finest hours.
What's interesting and applaudable about this collection is a desire to
reflect the whole of the Bat-mythos. In addition to the solo Batgirl story,
there's also material dealing with the Outsiders (Batman's early 1980s team)
and the Teen Titans (Robin's group). In fact, the motive behind including
"Shadow Play" may well have simply been to present a Man-Bat appearance. Also
collected here are stories from Batman #384, Detective Comics #571, The New
Titans #55, and DC Sampler #3.
As mentioned at the beginning of this piece, I haven't read all the stories
here -- but most of those I have are worthy efforts. In fact, based on these
stories, and assuming the same care and taste went into selecting the others,
if my wallet was any heavier, I'd be sorely tempted to pick this up to see
what I'm missing. As it is, I can say with reasonable confidence that Batman
in the Eighties is well worth the trip through time.
Cover price: $__ CDN. $19.95 USA.
Batman International 2010 (SC TPB) 168 pages
Written by Mark Waid, Alan Grant. Illustrated by Diego Olmos, Frank Quitely, Arthur Ransom.
Colours/letters: various.
Reprinting: Batman in Barcelona: Dragon's Knight one-shot (2009), Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #52-53 (1993), Batman: The Scottish Connection GN (1998)
Rating: * *
Number of readings: 1
Reviewed May 5, 2010
These days it often seems as though anything that gets published as a comic, inevitably makes it into a TPB collection a few months later. So you have situations like Batman: International where one suspects the point was simply to re-publish the recent Batman one shot, Batman in Barcelona, as a TPB...and to justify it by tossing in a few other "international" flavoured Batman stories to boost the page count. The problem with things like that is it can result in kind of slap dash TPBs.
I mean, doing a themed Batman collection of international adventures could be a fun gimmick -- y'know, collecting eight or ten stories, culled from over many years, could make a nice little grab bag of disparate tales. But by virtue of being a collection of only three stories, this demands that each story here be that much stronger to make up in quality what is lacking in quantity,
And the stories here just ain't much to write home about.
The gimmick behind the 38 page Batman in Barcelona: Dragon's Knight was to pair industry fav, Mark Waid, with Spanish artist Diego Olmos -- little known in North America -- for a tale set in Olmos' native Spain. Olmos is a perfectly okay artist, nothing more, and not enough so to justify the story on his own (the way, I'd argue, Claudio Villa's photorealist art on Marvel's Daredevil/Captain America one-shot, Dead on Arrival, almost justified the purchase of that comic by itself). While Waid's script is written on autopilot -- assuming you don't mind if your autopilot runs you into a mountain! Seriously, it's just a pretty bland, generic, and thin story. Villain Killer Croc has escaped prison, seeming crazed by some psychotropic drugs, and has gone on a killing spree in Barcelona in order to lure Batman after him so as to act out a restaging of St. George's battle with the dragon. Batman shows up, they have a couple of fights. The end. Honestly, that's all there is to it.
There's a lady friend of Bruce Wayne's, whose part is so small, so pointless and irrelevant, you assume she was only tossed in to play damsel in distress...only she doesn't turn out to have even that much relevance! As if recognizing how thin the story is, Waid throws in a surprise "twist"...except it's a pointless twist that makes the story even lamer than it already was. (And, no, we shouldn't wonder how a seven foot tall lizard man was able to inconspicuously book a flight to Europe).
Obviously, part of the point of an "international" story is the exotic locale, so there is some attempt to draw upon the local colour...but not enough to really distinguish the story (even the idea of Batman being hunted by the cops isn't that unusual). Indeed, it just draws attention to how poorly developed the plot is, when Batman is even told he's arrived on the eve of a Spanish festival honouring the St. George legend...and he still doesn't think to stake out the celebration.
Honestly, one has to assume Waid just knocked this out one afternoon to meet a deadline, rather than out of any inspiration.
Padding out the TPB comes a couple of older stories.
From Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight -- a comic with no regular creative team, so allowing for more or less stand alone stories and story arcs -- comes the two part "Tao". Written by frequent bat-scribe, Scotsman Alan Grant, and drawn by Arthur Ransom (marking the Englishman's first American comics work) it has Batman investigating an extortion racket in Chinatown, only to discover there's an Asian assassin following a similar trail -- an assassin Batman knew from years before. Cue: flashbacks to when they were both studying Taoism and martial arts in the Asian mountains. It's a pretty bland, non-descript tale, one that might've been an okay filler for one issue, but at two seems stretched, like Grant only agreed to do it if he could get two pay checks for it.
The idea of the adversary in a current case causing the hero to flashback to their shared history is nothing new -- nor even the Asian/martial arts milieu. In fact, around this time Batman: The Animated Series did a similar story. Maybe it was based on this comic...or maybe it just demonstrates what I mean about how standard the idea is (my imperfect recollection is that the TV episodes were better). The problem is, there's little personality for any of the characters -- even Batman. Nor is there any real twists or nuance to the story (it's not like he used to be friends with the guy and we learn how they had a falling out).
Maybe the selling point was Ransom's art, and the story was just an excuse to give him something to draw. Ransom's art is certainly impressive, in a British way, with a detailed, realist, fine art sort of style, heavily relying on shadows and light/dark contrasts (presumably because British comics artists are used to drawing for black & white comics). But it too has its problems. It's too dark, where a lot of the time you're struggling to make out what you're looking at. The lack of emotion/personality to the figures could also be attributed to the way Ransom draws faces and expressions.
The longest story in this collection, ironically, already existed as a graphic novel (as opposed to a folded spine comic book). Batman: Scottish Connection, written by Alan Grant (again!) and drawn by Frank Quitely. It's the best of the stories here -- and it still isn't much, and I review it in greater detail here.
My common complaint about all three stories is that they all seem rather thin, with meagre plots, little characterization, nor much originality. Maybe in writing about foreign locales, the writers kind of felt like it was a vacation...and didn't really require any work.
Still, as I say, another TPB of some of Batman's various globe hopping adventures might still be a fun idea for a collection. But as for Batman: International -- man, someone should sue the travel agency!
This is a review based on the original comics.
Cover price: $__
Batman-Judge Dredd: Judgment on Gotham 1991 (SC GN) 64 pages
Written
by Alan Grant, John Wagner. Illustrated and painted by Simon Bisely.
Letters: Todd Klein. Editors: Denny O'Neil, Steve MacManus.
Co-published with Fleetway Publications.
Rating: * * (out of 5)
Number of readings: 1
Mature Readers
Batman meets Judge Dredd (and Judge Anderson) while villain Judge Death meets villain the Scarecrow.
Batman is, of course, a costumed vigilante who lives in modern day Gotham City and is published by DC Comics. British creation Judge Dredd is a draconian police officer/judge/jury all in one who lives in a distant future and was published by Fleetway Publications (and various other companies in the U.S. -- including DC briefly). This company crossover has a Dredd villain, Judge Death (pursued by another Dredd villain, the comic relief Mean Machine) arriving in modern day Gotham City, while Batman gets flung into Dredd's future/alternate reality of Mega-City One. While Judge Death teams up with Batman's foe the Scarecrow in Gotham, Batman gets arrested by Judge Dredd in Mega-City One, eventually escaping with the aid of a more level headed, female judge, Judge Anderson. The two return to Gotham City to tackle the villains who're on a killing spree, with Judge Dredd in pursuit.
Judgment on Gotham (the first of three team-ups between the two) is kind of uneven. Judge Dredd is one of those comics which fans seem to acknowledge is violent and even fascist, but is labelled satirical. And this story is clearly meant to be silly in spots, but that's part of the problem. It's cute, it's even amusing...but it rarely quite becomes funny. Mean Machine is a big guy with a dial on his head that he can adjust to make himself meaner, whose chief tactic is to head butt people. That's kind of absurdly amusing the first couple of times, but wears thin after a while. Still, the story trundles doggedly along for the most part, not being particularly good, not being particularly terrible, but the conventional plot seems like John Wagner and Alan Grant (writers of both Judge Dredd and, in Grant's case, Batman) presumably banged it out over a cup of coffee (before their coffee had time to cool) and doesn't offer any surprises or clever ideas. And the violent climax just kind of drags on and on until, I'll confess, ennui set in.
Even the fish-out-of-water idea is barely explored. Batman doesn't really get a chance to run around Mega-City One, nor does Dredd explore Gotham. You come away not really having much sense of either characters' reality.
There are practical concerns with the story, too. Crossovers, let's face it, are not so much artistic excercises, but commercial ones. Two companies get together, hoping they can tap a new audience. That is, a Batman fan buys it, and gets turned on to Judge Dredd, or vice versa.
But Batman's a bit out of his element in a story that's not meant to be taken seriously. A dramatic character can function in a comedic environment as long as the character can stay in character. But the problem with a satire is that it's not really meant to be held up to analysis. Batman can't comment on what he really thinks of Judge Dredd's reality (other than a brief quip about Dredd being "gestapo"), 'cause it would force Judge Dredd into a more serious corner. As such, Batman has to be a bit of a blank slate, character-wise. Even ability-wise he is underused -- he doesn't escape from jail using his skills or intellect, he is broken out by Judge Anderson.
Judge Dredd fares even less well, appearing in only a few scenes in his own team up! Judge Anderson is featured more.
Wagner and Grant seem far more interested in the villains. More than a third of the pages are devoted to the villains (Judge Death, Scarecrow, Mean Machine) traipsing around with nary a hero in sight -- more pages, in fact, than are devoted to scenes of the heroes without the villains! I'm kind of cool to the idea that villains are more interesting than heroes, particularly when the villains are such motiveless, anarchic characters. And in the case of Judge Death, such a brutally violent character.
Simon Bisely's painted art is another mixed bag, all cartoony distortions, inflated muscles and extraneous lines and paint splotches. Painted comics are always kind of neat, and there's a certain atmosphere at work...but other times it works against any mood, with busy panels that are hard to figure out what's going on. It's certainly not a style that lends itself to subtle facial expressions which would convey emotion or characterization. And he seems to have one (surrealistc) style, meaning his Gotham (with cops driving racing cars and morgues like something out of gothic sci-fi) and Mega-City One look pretty homogeneous, robbing the story of what should be its point: the contrast between Batman and Dredd.
Recommended for mature readers due to violence. There's also a scene where Judge Death shows his willy, if that appeals to ya. Judge Anderson (the pretty, female character) has a couple of racy panels, too, but is draped in shadow. Ultimately, this is for Batman or Judge Dredd completists, but others might prefer to get a sample of these guys elsewhere.
Cover price: $6.95 CDN./ $5.95 USA.
Batman: The Killing Joke 1988 (SC GN), 48 pgs.
Written by Alan Moore. Art by Brian Bolland.
Colours: John Higgins. Letters: Richard Starkings. Editor: Denny O'Neil.
Rating: * * (out of 5)
Number of readings: 3
Mature Readers
The Joker, remembering how he was once a normal guy, driven insane by circumstances, sets out to prove it could happen to anyone. He cripples Barbara Gordon (the former Batgirl), and tries to drive her dad, Commissioner Gordon, insane with the crime. Batman eventually catches up with him.
I didn't much care for Batman: The Killing Joke, this definitely-not-for-kids story that most people revere. Firstly, it's not really a Batman story: not in the sense that Bats accomplishes much (he only finds the Joker because the Joker sends him an invitation!) or his character is explored or even that he has many lines. Essentially, it's the Joker's story.
The real problem, though, is that it's emotionally hollow. Alan Moore comes from the generation of writers (in movies, books, and comics) that equates "art" with brutality, where character and story are less important than "pushing the envelope". The Killing Joke is pretty icky...not to mention capable of being interpreted as misogynistic. The two female characters are just there to be brutalized to provide motivation for the male characters. This is particularly disturbing with Barbara Gordon, a long time DC character, whose emotional reaction to her own crippling is never even touched upon. Alan Moore (and co.) obviously consider her personal trauma irrelevant.
The story is awfully thin and never really delivers emotionally, or intellectually, and seem a little like a shaggy dog story in any event. I've never been that impressed with Moore's dialogue, but lines like "you whimpering little smear of slime" don't even warrant a comment. Alan Moore likes to play around with juxtaposition: words to images, images to images. But unlike, say, Frank Miller (at least, at the time), there's little emotional or thematic justification to them. A guy pulling the legs off his seafood dinner is juxtaposed with a doctor tugging on Barbara's paralysed legs. But what's the point, the subtext? At most it's a tasteless gag...and another indication of how Alan Moore and Brian Bolland feel about their female characters.
On the other hand, the story about the "two guys in a lunatic asylum" is memorable (though I'm not convinced it really meant anything).
Brian Bolland's art is O.K., but his "realist" figures can seem a little stiff, robbing the (overlong) action scenes of energy. And his Batman looks like just a guy in a cape...and about as intimidating as Adam West.
I would argue a better, emotionally richer (and better
plotted) take on the Batman-Joker relationship, and the Joker's insanity,
was J.M. DeMatteis and Joe Staton's Going Sane story line published a
few years later in Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight (granted,
writer DeMatteis had twice as many pages to play with).
I'm also a bit dismayed by the hypocrisy inherent in a
comic like this. It was released as a graphic novel, with a "mature reader"
warning, because it contains material inappropriate for a regular comic
with its broader-based readership. Fine. Very responsible. Except...the
story contains material (the crippling of Barbara Gordon) that has a direct
impact on regular Batman comics, meaning, if you were a Bat-fan, you kind
of had to buy it. In other words, DC comics protests and says, "Oh no,
kids, this isn't for you" and then winks and says, "But if you want your
collection to make sense...heh heh." Pretty sleazy. If a comic/graphic
novel contains material inappropriate for younger readers, it should be
self-contained, and not require younger readers to buy it. Others have
been guilty of the same thing (DAREDEVIL: Love and
War, for one) but the level of potentially "objectionable" material
in Batman: The Killing Joke is so extreme, and the impact on continuity
so major, it's the most blatant offender by far.
Still, proving that nothing is sacrosanct in comics, even this story, for all its accolades, has been somewhat nudged aside by later -- different -- Joker origins, including in Lovers and Madmen.
Original cover price: $4.50 CDN./$3.50 USA
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